Lost Friend

The Customer

It was just like any other winter morning at work. There were barely any customers at the auto parts store where I worked at and the temperatures were below freezing. A blizzard had come the night before and the streets had not been plowed yet. I had worked the night shift the day before and unfortunately opened the store this morning because I was covering for another employee who had just called in sick. Coffee, donuts and the freezing weather were the only things that kept me awake because I had not been able to get enough sleep. We weren’t busy so I went outside for a smoke. A couple minutes passed by and I noticed a car pulling into the parking lot. The car was making an unusual grinding and squealing noise. It sounded as if the belt was rubbing against some metal part or the pulley bearing had gone bad. As he got out of the car and was walking towards the store, I put my cigarette out and threw it in the overflowing cigarette disposal. The man was in a very nice suit and was clean shaved with his hair slicked- back. He looked tired and seemed like he had been on the road for a while. Realizing he needed help, we walked into the store together and I asked him if he needed any help. He told me that he was from out of town and was trying to get to his daughter’s house. But the car kept making the squealing noise and he was worried if there was something majorly wrong with the car.

To get a better understanding of what was wrong with the car we went outside. He had told me the car had been constantly stalling and the noise just kept getting worse. I grabbed some testing equipment from the back office to see what was causing his car to stall. Placing my hands on the battery, I connected the testing equipment to the positive and negative terminals. I couldn’t even feel my hands, my fingers trembled as I conducted the test. The temperature outside was negative twenty-five and I wasn’t wearing any gloves.

After doing a quick battery and alternator...